Defiance
by Sir Raphael
Summary: After Star Fox leaves Corneria on a morale raising patrol around Lylat, General Pepper orders the CSS Verity to scout out a Grallian star system. What was expected to be a three month journey becomes something nobody expected, ending in fire and ash.
1. Defiance, Prologue and Notes

**Defiance: Preface**

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_**Disclaimer**_

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I do not claim to own any part of Star Fox, which is held by Nintendo. All rights, including those to character, scenarios, and games are held by Nintendo. Unique characters and storyline are owned by me, Sir Raphael. If you wish to use these characters in a story or other piece of media, please contact me via personal message or at silverknight6 gmail . com.

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_**Author's Note**_: Defiance is a story placed as a sort of inset to Black Skies, where it starts on the main timeline but branches out into an alternate world. In this new future, what goes on is something of a mystery. I considered altering this story to be long before Black Skies, so that Star Fox are portrayed as the 'bad guys,' but considering advances in technology, a ship that old would be destroyed in seconds and defeat the point of this story.

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_**Synopsis

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**_It is the middle of the Grallian War. Star Fox has just left upon a long patrol across Lylat, at General Pepper orders the CSS LLRC Verity to do reconnaissance on a Grallian star system, along with Star Wolf, which will be looking elsewhere. En route the ship encounters a black hole-like anomaly that spins their world out of control.

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_**Cast of Characters  
**__**

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**__Crew of the Verity_

-Richard Alanaldo (Captain)

-Kelmar Jameson (Mechanic)

-Revi Jameson (Tactical Officer)

-Gary Klen (Medical Officer)

-Lionel Spor (Damage-Control Officer)

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	2. Event Horizon

**Defiance**

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_Author's Note_: This is the first chapter of Defiance, a tale set at some time in the universe of Star Fox- specifically, an alternate timeline of Black Skies. Before the Grallian War, the Lylatian Long-Range Cruiser (LLRC) was dispatched to investigate certain locations in Grall. On the way, the ship encountered an EMP wave cast by a class five black hole's expulsion beams. The ship slipped into the 'hole's' event horizon, caught inexorably in the swirl before she would take the final plunge into nothingness. 

The story begins with the expulsion beam. The rest will be shown as time goes on. The technology page has been imported from Black Skies.

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**Chapter 1 Event Horizon**

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Captain Alanaldo stood easily at his terminal, tapping keys and bringing up readouts. Various aspects of the ship, crew health rosters- every screen was perfect, a mass of green dots and a blank failure reticule. Smiling with no small amount of satisfaction, the otter turned and shut down the terminal, walking down a corridor to his quarters. That was the day the Verity departed. 

The CSS Verity was one of four all-otter ships in the Cornerian fleet. A Wildfire-class cruiser, she had served with distinction at the Battle of the Aparoid Homeworld, one of five such ships to survive and make it home. Her crew had then taken several months of shore leave, and had all received the Hero's Cross. For several days, the upgraded Verity, one of three experimental LLRCs. Distinguished by a two bands of deep red and gold running across her hull, the Verity's crew had much to be proud of, and all were excited to be heading out again. After a test firing of their streaming cannons, they were off on what was expected to be a three month reconnaissance mission.

Three weeks into the mission, the shi was rocked twice by a high energy yield shockwave. Captain Alanaldo brought the ship over towards the estimated point of emergence. As his crew watched the mainscreen, he piloted the ship in and sped up. Responding well to the manual helm, the Verity leapt forward into empty space, space that began to appear to be _too_ empty. With astonishing speed, the sensor boards went blank, seconds before the lights in the ship shut down. Chemical lights flared on as the ship lurched again.

"What in the name of Lylat wads that?" demanded Alanaldo, picking himself up. Kelmar, the ship's mechanic, immediately disappeared into an access hatch while Revi, Kelmar's brother, ran to one of the tactical consoles.

"Power's gone." said Revi, flipping the switch for the emergency reserves. There was no change. "Backup's gone too." Everyone on the bridge watched as Alanaldo walked over to the helm and yanked the stick sideways. No response. Alanaldo looked up and spoke easily.

"Is life support still functioning?"

"The mechanical systems are online, but those scrubbers and refreshers won't last long." said Gary, the ship's medical officer. Lionel, the damage-control officer reported no hull damage. Reports flooded in, but the captain held up a hand.

"Can we launch the escape pods?"

"Yeah, we'll just have to-" began Revi when the emergency power flared on. Consoles beeped as they rebooted, and Kelmar came back out of the panel.

"Don't have engines, shields, or weapons, but we have life support and sensors."

"Put 'em up, the visuals." said Alanaldo. Revi tapped two keys, and a patch of pure black showed up in front of the Verity. The captain looked at it until Revi confirmed his suspicions.

"Class five black hole. We must have been hit by the EMP emissions from one of the expulsion beams."

"Can we engage the engines?" There was quiet as Revi struggled to bring the engines back online, then everyone started as the otter slammed his rudder to the floor.

"Too late, sir. We've passed the event horizon."

"Warp drive?" inquired Lionel hopefully. Kelmar shook his head, cutting the captain off.

"Damaged. It needs power all the time- I wouldn't be able to repair it in time to get out. This is a _class five, _people. I'm no astrologist, but I've heard stories- we've only got hours."

"Stop that talk." said Alanaldo sharply. "People have gotten out through wormholes before. Just watch the walls."

"The walls, sir?" asked Gary.

"Yes, the walls. Class five holes are like double-funneled whirlpools. Towards the center, wormholes sometimes form in the walls. It's our best bet." With that, the captain dismissed the crew to their quarters, emptying the bridge but for himself. The otter ran his hands wistfully over the varnished oak paneling, and sighed. Moving silently about the room, he thought back on the ship's long and fruitful history.

Pursing his lips thoughtfully, he walked over to the terminal for the ship's log, and sat down to read. He accessed the logs from the Aparoid Homeworld, putting them up with a few key taps, then he dimmed the lights and sealed the door. His eyes roved down the logs, before he opened one of the video recordings.

* * *

_"Star Fox is going to take over the planetary operations from here." said Alanaldo, slapping his rudder down on the floor to quiet the crew. "I want a status report- how are we doing?"_

_"Shields are at 80 percent, hull plating took some concussive damage and it's at 95. All weapons are online except for that one streaming cell on the back right bank."_

_"I told ya we should've replaced it!" piped up younger Kelmar._

_"It would have blown out that relay." replied Revi with a snort. The two brothers began to quarrel until Alanaldo threw them apart with his paws and rudder. _

_"Enough, guys! Turn your focus on the bugs tryin' to kill us, not on your own rudders!"_

_It was about that time when the ship shook violently and a spray of sparks shot from the weapons terminal. Revi took one look at it before making his analysis- "Right streaming panel's been blown off!"_

_"Shields?" called Alanaldo._

_"60 percent and falling!" replied Revi. Kelmar swore and vanished down the bridge lift. The ship rattled and lurched hard, then began to shudder continuously as it was pounded with Aparoid lasers. Sparks were flying from consoles and the ceiling, and it wasn't long after before the damage reports began to come._

_"Shields down!"_

_"Aft hull plating is gone!"_

_"Hull breaches on C deck!_

_"Port engine is out!"_

_"Lift jam for the fifth tube!"_

_"Secondary computer systems offline!"_

_"Manifold leaks for the first and eighth chambers!"_

_"Life support failure!"_

_And then came the most dreaded announcement of them all. _

_"Infection detected- D deck! Get someone back there!" Almost immediately, power began to fail and an awful rattling began to echo through the halls. Alanaldo turned and gestured at Revi and Kelmar. "You two, grab weapons and come with me. Everybody else, keep fighting, and target the big guts first!"_

_A hiss announced the opening of the blast-proof doors, and the trio left, shouldering blasters and rifles as they went. As they made their way back through the ship, they began to notice blue veins that had glowing green sections running along their length. The tension rose and Kelmar fired his blaster pistol at one of the veins, which burst into flame and exploded. As the shrapnel rained down, the three dove for cover. When the dust cleared, Kelmar raised a sensor, then looked around wildly._

_"Go, let's go! Down, up, anywhere! That's about three millimeters of hull between us and nothing! C'mon!"_

_"Your idea!" yelled Revi as they continued down at a run. Rattling was soon heard, and Alanaldo's rifle was the first to take out an aparoid, even as the captain ducked to avoid a green and black laser that was shot back in return._

_"Grenade, get me a grenade!" he yelled. Kelmar pulled out one of the gray cylinders and hurled it at the wall across from him, sending the grenade bouncing into the infection zone. Shards of crystiline limbs went shooting by, then the three advanced into the cooridor. Revi brought his machine gun down and opened fire as Alanaldo wielded an upgraded gattling gun. As their guns clicked on empty, they switched to rifles and their blaster pistols, the firefight causing a din throughout the ship as the trio tried to force their way to the central infection- a hole surounded by glowing and pulsating metal punctuated here and there by ominous black claws._

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The video ended there, for Alanaldo distinctly remembered Revi shooting an aparoid that had been eating the camera cables. That had finished the system, which had taken days to repair. After the infection had been stopped in dramatic fashion and the infection quarentined with force fields, the Verity had managed to gather her strength and fire the few remaining cells and banks at the foe. Dozens of aparoids were destroyed, but Alanaldo also remembered the solemn moments as the crew watched cruiser after cruiser lose control and plummet to the planet in flame. Not a single ship surrendered- not one was competely taken. Each captain chose to crash his ship rather than be infected. 

The few infected Lerowing IIs had varied fates. Some were recovered, later to be repaired as the infected plate had no integrity- others had been so far enmeshed with their pilots that they 'died,' smashing into planetary remnants and other debris. The Verity was soon able to activate a prototype warp drive and escape, bot not before observing an intact Wildfire hull drift away, still covered in feebly struggling aparoids. Some swore they saw the ship's engines fire, but the ship had then jumped to warp and no one had wanted to come back.

Coming back to the present, the captain unsealed the doors and left the bridge to get some sleep. Rest, however, was not forthcoming, and so he joined a good portion of the crew in a poker game. The bets were wild and unrestrained- in their last moments, who would care about a few outlandish wagers?

* * *

As the cruiser tumbled towards the black hole, the crew began to drift back to their battle stations, where they had been on a loose alert before encountering the hole. The Verity's mission had been to investigate a portion of Grall in preperaion for an attack, and some fighting was expected. But inevitably, they began to gather in the confrence room and the bridge. They wanted to see their last moments, a morbid fascination that was not uncommon in such times. 

"There it is." breathed Lionel, looking at an hourglass-shaped patch of blackness. They were being drawn towards its center, but the ship then jerked upwards and was caught in the funnel disk and began to swirl about the center with increasing speed. The ship began to vibrate subtly as gravitational forces increased. Before anyone knew it, they were beneath the disk, in the tubes that lead to teh center- and their inevitable destruction. The black inky darkness that were the hole's walls whipped by. No one saw or sensed the flash of white that was a wormhole. Shoulders sagged. They would not make it after all.

The ship then sank into center. Everyone felt it, a terrible sense of vertigo while the ship's interior began to darken from the bottom up. The ship shook violently and integrity alarms blared. Some of the otters sat down quietly- others nearly fainted. Alanaldo rested a paw on the helm. It was the way of a captain, to go down with the ship.

It was some hours later by the ship's clock when the viewscreen turned white, but by the crew's reckoning, it had only been a few seconds. Shaking off his extreme lethargy, Revi and Kelmar crossed to the scanner panel while Lionel looked on, talking slowly.

"...don't understand...G-forces...too low..."

"...class five? Can't..."

"...in the name...alive?"

Slowly, everything seemed to clear, and when it did, the darkness lifted with a sharpness that sent everybody staggering. The otters were quiet until Alanaldo cleared his throat.

"Well, it would appear...that we are still living and breathing, gentlemen!"

There were yells and shouts of relief, crying and embracing, but also a great amount of curiosity. Why had they been spared? Sheer luck, or for some higher purpose?

It was only a few minutes later when the navigational systems brought up a map of the Horizon System, so named for forming the edge of the scanner umbrellas covering both Lylat and Grall. Coasting on shockwaves from the anomoly, the Veriy tumbled unceremoniously into orbit of one of the many planets of the uninhabited system, lit by its three stars.

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Far out in space, a charred hulk drifted through the void, armor scorched and halls empty except for the one room with a body, the bridge. Distant starlight illuminated the ship for an instant- tall masts and stout turrets, all worn from battle, vacuum exposure, and age. The ship then passed into darkness, but not before the starlight glimmered and reflected off a nameplate through a viewpane. 

The lapel was tarnished with the passing of time, but it was still legible- 'Captain Therald Pepper, Cornerian Star Fleet, First Class.'


	3. On the Horizon

**Defiance**

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_Author's Note_: As I'm writing this without waiting for feedback, which appears not to be forthcoming, it might be worse or better than the last chapter. I have no idea, so as readers, please drop me a loop to tell me how I'm doing. Oh, and V-Starfox and notfromEarth7, if you want, send me a PM if you want to read a snippet from Defiance's ending. sorry it's short. 

Sorry for the chapter title gag, by the way. :P

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**Chapter 2 On the Horizon**

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"Gravitational forces were significantly less than what we expected them to be." said Revi, glancing at a console. "Hence why we're still here. The forces we experienced weren't even a quarter of the forces exerted by a typical class-five." 

"The exterior hull plating took a little damage and there were some circuitry fires, but the ship came out all right." added Kelmar, running his fingers over a ship diagnostic while Leon double-checked his work.

"We have a few fires, but nothing big. They've put out three already, and the hull plating will be fine if shields are up."

"How about the warp drive?" asked Alanaldo. "It'd take us much more than three months to get to Grall on our engines, and even longer to get back to Corneria."

"Working on it, sir." said Leon. "It seems there was a small meltdown in the fifth injector. If it's fixed, we'll be able to go to warp- without blowing up."

"That's reassuring." remarked Alanaldo. "Anything else of note?" The captain's eyes roved over the map onscreen, then he squinted at a murky blotch in orbit around a gas giant. "Hey, Revi, can you take us closer to that star?"

"Yeah, we're coming up on it. Why?"

"You'll see. Someone, magnify that blotch over there- yeah, that one." The screen blurred briefly, then sharpened to show a fighter-carrier. The paint scheme was unmistakable.

"By the creator..." breathed Alanaldo. "That's Wolf's ship!"

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It turned out that the Verity's center engine had blown out several relays, and it therefore took some time to get to the shattered remnants of the Cornerian Wolf. When they arrived, the ship's identity was irrefutably determined. Gaping holes over the bridge told them they'd find no bodies, and scorch marks indicated the ship had come under heavy fire. A quick scan indicated two Wolfen fighters in the launch bay, both half destroyed by Grallian raiders. It wasn't long after that Alanaldo held a small memorial ceremony, and tried to raise Corneria. This having failed, he continued on his way before Revi could run a dating test. 

It would be a fateful decision. Had Revi been able to run his diagnostic, he would have found that the hull of the Cornerian Wolf had been damaged by more than laser fire- it had been subjected to a hundred years of vacuum exposure.

* * *

The Verity proceeded onwards towards Grall at full speed while Kelmar crawled through the injector tubes in an environmental suit, working to fix the warp system. This took over ten hours of straight work, but when an exhausted Kelmar tumbled out of the access tube, the job was done. The Verity shook slightly as it entered a slipstream and went to warp. 

"Hasn't it occurred to you as odd," asked Leon, "that we enter an anomaly, and the Cornerian Wolf suddenly shows up destroyed? What happened to the communications beacon Corneria had here?"

"Probably destroyed." said Revi thoughtfully. "Come on, let's get down to the mess hall."

The galley was, as always, filled to the brink. Kelmar had once joked that it would take another starship to contain the Canteen, as the mess was called. The food was good and the atmosphere cheery- over the Verity's lifetime, the crew had made the Canteen into something no other mess hall was, the equivalent of a Cornerian restaurant.

Sitting down at the lone empty table, the two otters got a meal and began to eat. Leon looked through the crowd, but didn't find the face he was looking for.

"Hey, where's Kelmar?" Revi took on a pained look.

"You know my brother- he worked himself half to death. He's busy sleeping it off in the crew's quarters. Ten hours straight in a tube a yard wide. That's not counting the fact that he was cleaning what was essentially radioactive slop and reinstalling a warp core in that injector."

Leon made a face. "I've never been one for crawling anywhere. Your brother spends more times on his knees pulling something apart than up on his feet!"

"Yeah, but the ship would have fallen to pieces long ago if it wasn't for him." observed Revi in a dry tone. "I don't think half the parts on this ship even _look_ like they're supposed to."

"Yeah, well, I couldn't tell a wing stabilizer apart from a warp injector." said Leon with a yawn. "All I'm supposed to do is tell when one blows up."

* * *

The first indication of trouble came when she ran into an enemy fighter. The Grallian made a sharp loop around the ship and opened fire, razor-edge fire burning into the shields. Even as Revi was analyzing the laser composition, the ship was swooping away and Leon began to call out the damage reports. The shields were at 96 percent- after being hit twice by one small fighter. 

Alanaldo had barely given the order to fire when the fighter was vaporized. He looked at Revi, who shook his head in concern. Kelmar glanced at Leon. "Concussive damage to hull plating, right?" he asked, then scurried out of the room.

Gary looked up, having been unable to make any sense of the readings on the screens. "Can someone tell me what the hell that was?" he asked. No one answered.

* * *

Revi was in sickbay later for a relivant, a dose of medicine to combat headaches. Gary administered the injection, and Revi stood up, rubbing his neck. "Thanks, doc." 

"Nothing to worry about." replied Gary with a beaming grin. "What were you working on?"

"Those lasers." said Revi. "Some weird calibration, absolutely tore apart the shields."

"Oh? Different?"

"Yeah, not what we've seen. I got Kelmar to mirror the configuration on our streaming cannons. Whatever the fighter was, we now have its technology."

"Yeah..." The officer thought briefly on that before he turned to a medical station and begin typing. Almost offhandedly he asked, "Were those the lasers that killed the Cornerian Wolf?"

"Probably." answered Revi. "I hadn't thought of that. We'll need to be careful."

"This mission was to duck in and duck out. Let's do that in one piece." said Gary grimly, before he closed his terminal. The two walked from sickbay as the lights dimmed behind them.

* * *

The ERS Maya drifted in space, engines burning sporadically as the ship shook, hit again by stellar debris. The haunted eyes of Captain Bernard looked up as he looked across what had once been his beautiful system of Eloria. Things weren't that bad, but the pain of having his home's identity stripped away was more than he and hsi fellow resistance members could bear.

Those that were left, anyway. His countenance was dark as he reached for the scanner toggle. The ship was the last of the resistance, and was over fifty years old. They had ten fighters in the launch bay, and about a hundred crew besides him. That was the resistance against Grall, after all the years of hard-fought and bitter struggles. They had lost.

And Captain Bernard would spare this fate from the ship he'd sighted ahead on the scanners. A ship as old as his was, a ship that was the last of its kind, just like his. Engines burned brightly as the Maya burst to warp in a haze of white. His computer told the story as he left the bridge in sudden exhaustion.

Course: Intercept  
Target: CSS Verity  
ETA: 1 hr, 30 min. 


	4. Termination

**Defiance**

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_Author's Note_: Thanks you guys for your reviews. GL, I'm not quite sure of the logic behind leaving the Cornerian Wolf before taking off, though it might be that such quantum scans can take quite awhile to run and they thought they were still in their own time. Why run quantum scans in your own time period when you can actually see the laser and torpedo marks? They could logically assume the ship just got ripped up in battle. Thanks as well to foxbird22. However, as I said, Defiance isn't my sole project, so its quality may suffer as a result. However, I'll be trying to describe my characters in greater detail in TUE.

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**Chapter 3 Termination

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**"Scanners are picking up ahead," said Revi. "Looks like a ship." 

"Obviously," snorted Kelmar. "What else could it be, a sentient asteroid? A missile?" As the two fell to arguing again, Alanaldo looked at the blank viewscreen with a look of expectance on his face. He cleared his throat and adjusted his uniform, twitching the gold studs.

Revi stopped arguing with his brother just long enough to punch up the image upon the viewscreen before resuming his quarrel, having checking to see if the unknown ship had weapons. The captain listened to the bickering for a few seconds later before he turned and silenced them with a curt order and an icy stare. He looked back at the ship suspiciously.

The ship was not one of the blockier weapons ships, nor one of Grall's sleeker warships. The ship had a long, tubular system with what looked like launch bays situated beneath it. Large cannons were inset into the ship's rounded prow, while the bridge was nestled at the back of the ship, several communication arrays pointing up in front of it. Near the center of the tube-like body were two downward-pointing wings with engine pods mounted at their tips. The wings were swept back at a 45 degree angle to the main hull, with smaller wings half the size of the main sets pointed horizontally and forwards at the same angle adjacent to the bridge, thrusters mounted upon it. Coupled with the main engine burning from two rectangular slits behind the bridge, the ship bore a distinctly predatory appearance.

"Doesn't look like a Grallian," Alanaldo said, "but you can't be too sure."

"I agree to the beginning," piped up Kelmar, "from the hull shape. See the long design? Grallians don't make ships like that, doesn't give them an acceptable weapon to mass ratio. They don't use wings much, either. Looks like one of the ships from that resistance we've heard about."

Alanaldo agreed with Kelmar, nodding towards Revi. The other otter opened a line to the other ship. There was a brief period of white noise and screen snow before a hazy image swam into focus and the background static began to clear.

"Cornerian ship, this is the ERS Maya," said a tired, worn-out looking creature. His face was long and he had an air of defeat about him. What of the ship that could be seen showed signs of hard years. Some of the plating was buckled inwards and many terminals were blinking feebly. The captain continued. "I'm not sure why it took you so long to get here, but you're too late. We were crushed."

"I beg your pardon?" asked Alanaldo sharply.

"Were you not sent to give the Resistance relief?" asked the other captain. He looked almost crestfallen when Alanaldo shook his head. Then his expression changed to one of anger. "Lylatians...you're all talk." Bitterly, the other captain shut the channel and began to move his ship off.

"Revi, can you get a tractor lock on that ship?" queried Alanaldo. Revi shook his head.

"There is too much interference, captain. He is not responding to hails."

"Let him go, then," said Alanaldo in a heavy voice. "We have a job to do first. Then, we'll see if our Resistance ship is still around."

* * *

The Resistance ship was indeed still around, tailing the Verity with dogged determination. While it had made no attempt to harm the cruiser, it made no gestures to help either. The Verity spent days scanning the planets of Eloria before turning to the capital planet, Lence. As they neared it, however, Revi looked up sharply. 

"We have Grallian hull signatures, dead ahead."

"I see them," said the captain. He put his ship hard over towards what looked like a debris field. Revi was shaking his head in puzzlement as the Verity began to accelerate, quickly outpacing the two Grallian ships ahead to slip into the debris. There was no sign of the Resistance ship.

"Funny," said Revi in a soft voice. "These are Grallian hulls around us, captain. And they're battle damaged."

"A battle with the resistance?"

"I can't be sure, but...the blast marks look akin to those made by our type three streaming cannons."

"Puzzling indeed..." said Alanaldo. "Kelmar, can you run a dating scan on one of the destroyed ships?"

"I'm on it." The bridge was silent while the scans were being run, save for the tapping of keys and the tones from the computer. Revi tapped his footpaw and brushed at his fur. Gary left for sickbay. Lionel simply sat quietly at his station, watching an idle diagnostic scroll before him. Kelmar looked up, and the rest of the bridge jumped at the motion.

"Well, Mr. Jameson?"

"Sir, it looks to be about five years old."

"That would put the date of this battle within the lifespan of the Elorian Resistance," said Alanaldo. "They must have similar weapons to us." His interest in this discovery soon faded. "What of our Grallian friends?"

"They look as if they are ready to conduct a grid search of the field," said Revi. "If we time a chemical burn, we could slip into one of the searched sections without showing up on their sensors."

"Do it," ordered Alanaldo. Revi took a breath, then flipped power to the chemical engines and fired them. Alanaldo deftly flipped the ship over to avoid striking a hull fragment. Then they came over a particularly large wreck just in time to see the stern of one of the Grallian cruisers pass behind another hulk. Alanaldo breathed a sigh of relief before he pushed the ship into the safe grid.

"That ship was quite larger then anything I've ever seen," muttered Kelmar. There was no argument there.

They drifted in the debris field for some time before the Grallian ships left, apparently satisfied. It was only then that the Verity cautiously nosed out of the field and slipped into orbit around Lence, taking quick scans and preparing to jump to warp. Then, a purplish beam streaked out from the planet's surface and impacted the Verity with a tremendous explosion. The ship reeled, sparks flying from the impact area as the damaged shield grid struggled to compensate.

"Shields at thirty percent!" yelled Revi, hauling himself up from the floor. His fur was streaked with sweat ad he finally got upright, eyes going instantly to his terminal. "Most of the starboard streaming arrays are gone, sir!"

"I want all auxiliary power to the shields, now!" ordered Alanaldo. "Kelmar, warp drive?"

"Online, sir!"

"Engage!"

The Verity leapt into warp just as another shot struck it. The auxiliary generator exploded into flame and sparks and the ship spun out of control, dropping from warp mere seconds after it had jumped. But they were now far from the planet, and that was the important thing. A large portion of the ship's hull was shattered, hull plating simply blown away to revealing charred and scorched girders behind them. The explosion had ripped away everything but the hull braces, which lent themselves to the eerie resemblance of the ship to a skeleton. Flames fueled by air jetting from hull breaches flickered weirdly amidst the twisted and charred metal, adding a hellish red glow to the scene. Black smoke streamed from this gaping wound like blood, only to be lost against the black void of space.

* * *

"Any sign of the Resistance ship?" asked Alanaldo, watching the repair parties moving about the bridge. One leapt back as a terminal sparked, the crewman nursing a shocked and numb finger.

"None, sir," replied Lionel, standing next to him. "Gary wants to see you in sickbay, sir." The other otter brushed longer fur down and back, shaking his head again when not pleased with the brushing.

"Alright then," replied the captain offhandedly. "I'll go do that now. And you can stop brushing your fur. None of us will be winning a beauty contest any time soon."

Evidence of the powerful weapon used against the Verity manifested itself in a thousand different ways. It was the man tearing out wall panels to bare damaged circuitry, the small fires raging in side corridors, the damage-control parties running about with fire extinguishers and force field patches. It was the flickering ceiling lights and sparking consoles, the malfunctioning ventilation grids that coughed erratically and the frantic crewmen clambering all over the ship with wrenches and survival equipment in hand. Thoroughly shaken, Alanaldo shuddered and loosened his uniform slightly to give himself more breathing room as he reached the sickbay.

When the doors open, he was treated to an awful sight. Bodies lay upon cots in a position of repose, covered by a clean, white sheet. They were faceless bodies, and Alanaldo only knew them by numbers. And once you began to think about casualties and deaths as numbers, then you knew your heart had fled and your soul had failed. He looked away when he noticed that bloodstains were slowly spreading across the sheets. He then saw Gary, the otter dressed also in a plain white coat and a doctor's headlamp. His dark brown eyes bore no glint of excitement or life, and his face was set, mouth in a grim line. And while shorter then Alanaldo, he seemed much greater now in stature, a grim, solemn statue of an otter who was even now reaching into the deepest wells of his strength to go on.

"How many?" asked Alanaldo in a soft, flat tone. He waved a hand lifelessly. "How many died?" Gary switched off his headlamp and looked at his captain, whiskers drooping and his face exhausted. His lips parted to give the answer.

"Thirteen," he whispered. Alanaldo looked absolutely crushed, and it took all of the nerve the doctor had to steel himself for what he had next to say. "And...we didn't recover all the bodies. Crew manifests say at least fifteen more." It pained the doctor to see his friend's face, which seemed to crumple inwards as the other tried to bring himself to terms with the loss.

It was not merely the loss of 28 men and women. Alanaldo averted his eyes as Gary handed him a data pad with a list of the dead. His eyes moved from name to name as he read, sometimes going over the same name several times.

The loss was far more personal to him then it would be for most other captains. Many of the fatalities were members who had served under him since the Aparoid War, some even before then. He had known almost all of them personally, as well as many of their families. The names he did not know invoked fresh pangs of pain within him, for he would have liked to know them better.

Above all, he wondered what he could say to the families of the deceased when they got home. The ship's motif said that her crew would die in battle, and never lower their flag. Alanaldo felt shame wash over him like a black wave. He had dishonored his crew and his ship. These men and women had not died in battle. They had died on a scouting mission, and he had not even fired a single shot back in return.

He looked over at Gary, eyes wet. "Thanks," he said, but there was no heart in it. They exchanged sad, knowing looks at one another before an alarm began to sound from one of the wounded men's beds and the doctor rushed off. Now bled dry of emotion, Alanaldo numbly walked to the door and left the room, a room where the crew should have healed. They should have been alive in that room, not dead. And then he realized how empty the ship now seemed, the ghosts of her dead crew plying the ship unseen and unheard. They were now a crew of just fifty on a ship designed for a crew of eighty.

The Verity was not long in repairing her damaged warp drive and bracing the damaged portion of the ship. Red lights now lined the airtight doors in the section bulkheads, but the ship was now warp ready, and she dragged her prow about slowly towards home. As the Verity came about, her bridge fell into darkness, there for an instant as but an outline. Then the ship shot forward in a flash of light and was gone, now on her way home.

* * *

The ERS Maya lurched as she was hit again, her captain clinging onto his console as he struggled to keep the ship level. He tapped a button for shipwide communications. As soon as he heard the acknowledging beep, he cleared his throat. "This is the captain speaking. All hands to fighters, immediately!" So saying, he grabbed onto the flight yolk ahead of him and turned it hard to one side and back. The Maya responded to the touch with exact precision, the ship looping up and to the right. Structural pylons groaned and strained as the ship was put under forces greater then it had handled for several years. Hull plating in several places began to the bend inwards under the stress until the captain braced the hull with force fields. Long trails of blue, intersected with rings of white followed behind the Maya's engines as the ship spiraled over another Grallian warship. The triad had allowed the Maya to slip away once more, and her captain took full advantage of that fact as he pummeled the ship ahead of him mercilessly. Two arrays of Cornerian streaming cannons lanced out, blowing off one of the Grallian's engines. A shot from the forward laser cannons ignited the engine plasma and caused the other ship to explode in a series of chain explosions. As the detonations increased in intensity, the Maya bucked and shot away as the power core completely destabilized and went critical, producing a violet shockwave that rocked the other two Grallian warships. Minor explosions erupted all over their hulls, and the Elorian fighters capitalized on this moment of vulnerability. Many had turned into the wave or hidden behind the larger warships to mitigate the damage, and as this left most of them undamaged, they pressed their attack on the enemy vigorously. The second Grallian warship succumbed to the horde of fighters, but as the Maya came around to destroy the third, scorching a great hole into the Grallian's armor, return fire blew a hole into the power junction just forward of the wing, a massive circle of blackened hull plating surrounding it. A trail of plasma began to leak from the junction, smoke and sparks spraying from the breach. Sheets of sparks ignited particles of plasma that were spinning off behind the ship. The burning plasma appeared as tiny stars that burnt with a shimmering rainbow light that seemed to send spikes of radiance off into the night. The fighters and the Maya's aft guns drove off the Grallian ship briefly, which allowed the Maya to hastily collect her fighters using a crash landing pad on the upper half of the tube. The emergency hangar's doors quickly rushed shot and closed with a muffled clang. Pilots waited for their safe lights to go on while the hangar pressurized, but even as they began to clamber out, many were hurled to the ground, breaking their falls with rolls as the Maya leapt to warp, leaving an enormous wake of eerie, spectral lights of an azure color. These swirled about, shifting in color weirdly before dissipating and fading from sight, leaving only tiny, winking, white lights to show that the Elorian ship had ever been there. 


	5. Report

**Defiance**

* * *

_Author's Note_: Well, foxbird22, if the Grallian weapon can take the Verity's shields to thirty percent on the first hit, did you really even dare hope that the crew could survive a second hit with no casualties? As for Mr. Captain, well...I know he seemed a bit deranged, but that wasn't my intent, believe me! Short chapter. 

And welcome back, notfromEarth7. Sorry that Black Skies has been falling behind a bit, it's just that it's kinda hard for me to continue with it at the moment. Writer's block of sorts.

* * *

**Chapter 4 Report**

* * *

"General Pepper will not be pleased to learn that the Grallians nearly took us out with two shots," muttered Alanaldo. Nobody disagreed as the otter sat at another terminal, typing a report to be submitted ahead of their arrival at Corneria. His able paws flew over the keypad, and type streaked across the screen with blazing speed. Letters blurred together as he continued to type at a furious pace before he slacked off, stopping to think. "Doubtless, we'll all be court-martialed." he said. Behind him, Gary and Revi exchanged a glance. It was clear that the captain was suffering from exhaustion, and that it was impairing his judgment. Gary cleared his throat. 

"Captain? I'm invoking Medical Order One- if the captain of a warship is exhausted to the point that his performance at his duties is showing less then sound judgement, the medical officer relieves the captain of duty until he is sufficiently rested for battle."

Alanaldo glared at him, eyes throwing optical daggers that caused his doctor to wince and look away. "Don't you have something to do in sickbay?" he growled. Gary stood firm, turning to face him again.

"That was an order, captain," he repeated. He tapped several keys into his console- a save message flashed above Alanaldo's report before the terminal shut down, displaying a lockout screen. "You are relieved of duties until further notice." Gary's eyes flashed, daring Alanaldo to challenge him. For a moment, the captain looked as if he was about to physically strike Gary- then he wordlessly stalked off the bridge towards the private lift that lead to his quarters. Everyone breathed a silent sigh of relief as the lift doors closed behind him.

* * *

Stars flashed by the narrow viewpane as Alanaldo looked out into space. The starfield was vast and it gave him a sense of perspective on his place in life. Which, until recently, had been one of great merit. 

Richard Alanaldo had joined the Cornerian Army to help support his family. Until the advent of the Aparoid War, the Cornerian Starfleet was not a sovereign service, and he's worked hard in the Cornerian Army. Foot soldiers were valued over pilots, but Richard had shown no talent for slogging through the mud toting pounds of heavy gear. He had transferred to the fleet as quickly as possible, avoiding almost entirely the chaotic and often short life of a tank or infantry soldier. He'd first gone to space in a Spitter Mk. 3 trainer craft, then had quickly moved onto the service's first fighter craft, the Starstormer. A cheap bucket, to be sure, but it was still the best of its day, fitted with the then-revolutionary G-Regulator. Although the device was extraordinary unreliable and feared more by the mechanics then the fighters, it was a great step ahead towards the building of Corneria's most effective fighter in its history, the Jackrabbit, known in the service simply as the Cornerian Fighter.

The Cornerian Fighter carried a very-much improved G-Regulator that put it at the top of its class. The gravity regulator manipulated gravitational forces directly around the ship, adjusting its strength to put the ship into different flight attitudes. In an emergency, the G-Regulator could even be used to hold the ship together.

Andross's Invaders were more often then not equipped with only rudimentary propulsion systems, but one out of every five ships would usually be a Nemesis, which carried one of Andross's inventions, the G-Slipstream. The G-Slipstream caused the ship to simply slip through gravity, which gave it a great deal of maneuverability. However, the disadvantage was that by completely canceling the effects of gravity and weight, the ships tended to have a lowered structural integrity. Both the G-Regulator and the G-Slipstream were easily shorted out by laser fire on the shielding.

Richard Alanaldo had been a squad commander at the Battle of Sector Y, and had been one of the few survivors of the CSS Valiant, which was destroyed by four of Andross's stellar combat suits. But by that time, of course, the G-Regulator was already eclipsed by the experimental G-Diffusers on Arwings flown by elite units and some highly-profitable mercenary squadrons. Alanaldo never got the chance to fly one, however- towards the war's end, his abilities were put to use commanding a capital ship.

The Aparoid War had come several months after his promotion to captain. He'd served with distinction as an acting commodore throughout the duration of the conflict, but after the destruction of most of his fleet at the Aparoid Homeworld, Alanaldo had graciously stepped down to allow those trained the Academy way into a command spot. Now here he was, with another Lylat Bar for his service during the Battle of the Blockade. But ever since he'd taken this cursed scouting mission, everything had been going wrong. First, they were nearly killed by a freak black hole, then they were hunted by two Grallian attack cruisers, and as if to top the icing on the cake, they were hit by a orbital laser with a yield ten times that of any weapon Corneria professed to have. There was something dangerous down there, and Alanaldo resolved to write a detailed report on it for Beltino to analyze, and hopefully to prevent more casualties by this weapon's paws.

Alanaldo stood staring out at the stars for some time before he went to his desk to continue writing his report. The exhausted otter fell asleep not long after, a grey-whiskered head falling upon well-toned arms as he drifted off and his thoughts scattered.

* * *

The ERS Maya was losing plasma fuel rapidly from the hull breach, despite efforts to close the junction. As the ship's fuel reserves became increasingly low and dipped ever closer to the level whereupon it was no longer safe to engage in any sort of combat, the Maya's captain began to increase the ship's warp factor, increasing speed. The warp drive did not rely upon plasma fuel- the main engines did. Eloria was now well guarded, and any plasma hotspots would be firmly under Grallian control. The Maya needed fuel to continue her quest to retake her homeland, and with the plasma synthesizers unable to keep up with the loss, there was only one place to get plasma. 

That source was currently traveling away from them at high warp. However, the ship was not Elorian-made, and her high warp was only about the middle range for the Maya's class. They would overtake the Cornerians in just under five hours.

The ship's captain could not help but give a chuckle. The Cornerians could pay in plasma for their failure to assist them when the Resistance had needed it most. And while this would not assuage their debt, perhaps their ship would.

* * *

"Captain to the bridge," said Gary. Alanaldo started from his sleep, looking up at his comm panel. He answered it by closing the channel. He stretched and activated his lift to the bridge, arriving seconds later. He blinked sleepiness from his eyes. He could barely believe he'd actually fallen asleep writing his report, and he was still feeling exhausted. 

His bridge crew looked at him, waiting for him to take command. He walked up to his command post and looked about. "Situation report?"

"Elorian ship behind us, closing fast," replied Revi, keeping his eyes straight ahead of him. Alanaldo noticed the little slight, but ignored it. There were more important things then bickering with his crew when they thought him exhausted.

"Intentions?"

"Apparently hostile." Silence greeted that remark, and Alanaldo's eyes knitted. It was a very serious call to make. He looked up and made careful eye contact with his tactical officer.

"How did you determine this?" he asked carefully. Revi made a motion, and Alanaldo stepped behind him and looked at his console. A diagram of the Maya was spinning slowly, and a green tracer line ran to what appeared to be a breach in her hull. More lines trailed around behind it.

"Plasma leak. We're the only source of plasma available for them right now."

"Why us?" asked Alanaldo, disbelieving. "It's a tall thing to believe."

"Well, let's see. In their view, we abandoned them, refused to help them...we are apparently now an enemy of the Resistance. It will make fighting Grall very difficult."

"That's the least of my concerns," replied Alanaldo. "According to him, the Resistance was basically wiped out. We drop from warp, shoot to disable, and get out of there. The weapon on Lence is the worrying thing."

"The Elorian ship managed to take out two Grallian warships and severely damage a third. I doubt the Verity could do as much," replied Revi. Alanaldo shook his head.

"We destroy half of Andrew's mercenary army and help draw half the aparoid armada away from Star Fox, protect the Orbital Gate, and you don't think we can take one lousy ship from a system of engine-builders. We'll stay on this heading. We can make the Horizon System- we'll simply use a planet as cover and out maneuver them."

He nodded. "Try and get this ship as battle-ready as you can. Grallian shielding tears almost like paper after a few rounds. Make sure ours doesn't do the same."

"Still," muttered Kelmar, "three ships!" He shook his head and disappeared from the bridge, heading towards the ship's shield generator.

When he arrived at the generator, he ushered away the others tending to it and locked himself into the room, access panels turning red as he activated a lockout. This was his job, and he would do it alone.

The shield matrix was a model of the Verity, suspended within a magnetic force field. Within the ship model was a large, spherical object- the generator itself. Kelmar disengaged the holographic projection of the Verity to lay bare the generator, and he surveyed it with interest.

Some people considered shields to be regenerative blankets, and it was, in a way, true. But they forgot the critical reality of a blanket- poke it long enough, and you've got a hole. Damage to a shield grid meant that, while the shields could regenerate, that portion of the shield would be forever weaker then undamaged portions, meaning one had to replace shield generators after a catastrophic battle to prevent a terrible collapse. And such damage to the shield would also deal damage to the generator itself.

Cornerian shield technology worked on a principle of extrapolation. If the shield generator was left suspended in its magnetic field without the holographic model around it, it would project a circular shield around the ship. The holographic model would cause the shield to distort around the model and generate the hull-tight shield grid that gave Cornerian models their strength.

Kelmar surveyed the shield generator with interest. Sections facing the damaged parts of the ship had had their amplifying crystals blackened and dim, no longer shining out over the model.

Kelmar took his sonic micro-scrubber and quickly set to work. The blackened scum could be scraped away for a time to revitalize the shield grid, but the scraping would eventually damage the crystals permanently and beyond repair. A whining pulse filled the air as his tools activated, black flakes of burnt crystal disintegrating into impotent dust which drifted to the floor in a cloud.

* * *

Revi returned to the bridge from a brief break to find an exhausted Alanaldo at the helm, keeping one eye upon a map of their course. Revi's sharp eyes quickly made out a dotted yellow line- their intended course- and a red trail with a blinking dot upon it, their actual course and the computer's prediction as to its destination. He could see the red line was curving away from the yellow one, and even as he watched, Alanaldo growled angrily and heaved the ship back on course. 

Well, that explains the lurching, realized Revi. This explained the sudden, grating shaking the ship was experiencing every few minutes.

"Problems, sir?" he asked in a helpful voice, returning to his station. Alanaldo grunted.

"The damaged section of the ship is causing particle drag," he said. "Slipstream particles are flooding the section and pulling us off course."

"Of course," replied Revi, then he blanched when he realized his poor choice of words. "Sorry, no pun intended," he added with great haste. Alanaldo grumbled something and refocused his eyes on his console.

"The Elorian's catching up. How is the ship?" he asked after an awkward pause. Revi immediately latched onto the new topic.

"Kelmar has the shield grid up from eighty percent to ninety-five percent capacity," he began, "and he is working on bracing the damaged portions of the hull. He has also gotten many of the starboard streaming arrays to function properly and has realigned the ship's focal laser. We should be well prepared in those respects. The engines are also now at full capacity."

"Good to hear," said Alanaldo, turning to Lionel for a confirmation. The other otter nodded, stepping away from the screen behind him to show the blanket of green.

"Most of our systems," he said, "are now operational over the acceptable standard of seventy-five percent."

"Good work," replied Alanaldo. "And I think I will be taking Gary's advice now. You have the bridge, Revi," he finished, and then he returned to his quarters by way of the direct lift. Revi simply shrugged and resumed his work, not noticing as the ship began to drift off course again. Lionel, however, did, and he leapt to the helm and twisted the ship back on course a bit more sharply then he should have.

"By the creator!" yelled Kelmar over the comm, "a bit more gently, Lionel! You don't make a thirty-degree turn that fast at high warp!"

"Sorry," answered Lionel in a sheepish voice. "I'll leave the piloting to you, O almighty one."

Kelmar muttered something unintelligible and closed the channel. Revi raised an eyebrow at Lionel. "Somehow," he said, "I don't think that course correction was worth that."

Kelmar shook his head in irritation, returning his focus to the shield generator. It glowed faintly as the crystals now began to repair the damaged shield matrix. He scraped away the last traces of black and stepped away from the large module, reactivating the holographic model of the Verity. Power flooded into projector systems, then into the generator. The device lit up with sparkling light, shimmering and spearing outwards from the facets of each crystal. The ship shook ever so slightly as the shield grid was reestablished.

Kelmar dusted his hands in satisfaction and unlocked the room, moving now to the ship's damaged starboard side. He donned a pressure suit and then slipped through the sealed door.

It was eerie. The floor beneath him was not very stable, and the charred, hulking frames of broken and damaged hull girders presented a web of darkness against the ambient white hue of the warp stream. Carefully hitching a magnetic line to the door, the otter took a step forward, a large sack of plain nodes in one hand. So long as he remained in contact with the ship, he was safe. But if he tripped...

The otter shook that thought from his head, and he fastened one of the grey nodes to the extreme corner of the damaged sector, where the blackened girders met undamaged hull plating. It blinked slightly as he moved around the perimeter of the ship's remains, swearing whenever Lionel made a course correction, one that would invariably hurl him into something. Rubbing himself to relieve some of the aches now pervading his body, Kelmar glanced up at a support, then leapt onto it and climbed to the next level.

Node upon node was fastened to the remaining framework of the Verity. Kelmar dropped to the main deck cautiously. As soon as his paws left the ship, he felt himself being hurled backwards. His magnetic line held, and his paws hit the deck. The otter lurched forward, then recovered, moving quickly back to the airlock door. He pressed a button on the arm of his suit.

A node flickered to life, a thin beam of azure light sparking from a number of open ports. The beam struck another node, which in turn fired off other lances of light. Like a spider's web, the bluish rays began to crisscross the area, visible clearly through the maze of girders. The floor began to reflect the spectral cast of the light now flooding through the ship. Then, with impossible speed, a blue field began to leap through the web, slamming into each new beam of light and spilling over with a bright flash. It was not long before the entire side was covered by the brilliant, shimmering azure of the containment field, which began to spark as particles skipped off its surface.

Pleased with his work, Kelmar retreated back into the ship, the airtight door closing behind him. Its red light indicating a safety seal dimmed, then finally went out as oxygen flooded into the damaged compartments, a breath of life entering a wounded limb of the ship.

* * *

"Engines are at full, captain. Fighters are standing by and ready for launch." 

"Acknowledged. Tell the men to get ready for boarding." The channel, audio-only, closed with a soft click. The captain looked ahead through his viewscreen, drumming his fingers. Lasers could not be fired at warp speeds, nor could his streaming cannons fire. But he had a compliment of torpedoes, and that would be persuasion enough.

* * *

Alanaldo swept onto the bridge, the crew at their stations once more. The distance between the ships was almost negligible now. He nodded at his crew, indicating for them to begin their reports. 

"Weapons ready."

"Engines ready."

"Shields at full capacity."

"Damage control parties standing by."

"Boarding party ready."

"Sickbay ready."

"Hull plating polarized."

"Distance, ten-thousand."

Alanaldo drummed his fingers upon his console. "Let's give them hell," he said then, and the Verity shook beneath his steady paws as a torpedo slammed into it.

The sparkling globe of yellow energy smashed into the Verity's aft shield grid, the warhead within detonating with an explosive shower of sparks and a consuming ball of angry flame. The shields flared, rainbow colors shimmering and sparking down its surface, repelling the fire and the force back into space. A second torpedo, then a third struck the defensive matrix, and it turned these attacks as well.

Revi looked at Alanaldo. "This ship is not equipped with warp-ready weapons," he reminded the captain. Alanaldo replied by twisting the helm. The Verity began to slew away, dropping from warp. The Maya faded into view seconds afterwards, a bright wake of blue lights trailing behind it.

Alanaldo immediately heaved the ship hard over and opened fire. Azure lancelets of blue light exploded from impossibly bright streaming cells, lit now with the mighty power of a Cornerian starship. Then a furious spur of red laser-fire screamed from the Verity's prow, the focal laser raking down one of the Maya's wings.

The Elorian danced upwards, ship spinning and avoiding the streaming bursts the Verity fired at it. Rear-mounted aft cannons spat fat globules of yellow energy that spattered across the Verity's shields, turning her prow away. Then the Maya came in in a banking turn, streaming cannons and powerful, golden beams of electricity arcing out from her guns. The streaming cannons simply fizzled into nothingness upon impact with the Verity's shields. The golden lasers ripped into them. The shield generator began to blacken, but answering a surge of power, the damaged crust exploded away, and the beams broke to pieces, shattered by the force of the shields.

The Verity's two stern focal lasers fired out, and the ship spun into a hard turn. This time, not one, but three focal lasers fired from the ship's prow, all mounted directly next to one another. The combined power of these weapons of wore tore the Maya's starboard wing to shreds, gaping holes now showing through them and blackened and burnt hull plating falling away like a burnt onion skin.

Not hampered in the least, the Maya twirled away in a dance of death, flipping over and coming back at the Verity. Golden lasers spewed from her cannons, pinning the cruiser with their force. The shield grid collapsed and the hull plating was blown apart, only the sudden rush of power to the polarization systems holding it together.

The Verity fired rockets on her port side and kicked around, jetting straight at the Maya. Her cannons roared out again, filling the void with luminescent brilliance. The Maya rocked, another breach opening. Then her underbelly opened, and fighters screamed away. Almost immediately, a hail of laser fire peppered the Verity's hull, leaving ovular scorch marks upon the armor. Point defense lasers ripped out and into the milling ranks of these fighters, missing many but striking a few. Focal lasers swept through the cloud, carving a channel through them. Five ships were immediately vaporized by the attack.

The Maya closed.

The Verity pinwheeled away, cannons firing.

A ripping explosion tore out fuel bunkers on the Maya's port flank.

A chain of fireballs blew out hull plating on the Verity's port side, wispy atmospheric gas being snatched into space's hungry jaws.

A focal laser and an Elorian cannon round collided and blew up with a massive explosion of crackling energy that fizzled like a lightning storm before disappearing.

The Verity tumbled away erratically, smoke pouring from one flank.

The Maya desperately closed, her main hull colliding with the Cornerian ship's docking ports. She had a single shot to dock, such was her fuel shortage. There was an echoing clang as the docking port sealed.

A door opened, and the sound of hand lasers filled both ships. Everything came down to this, a traditional attack stemming back to the days when ships crafted from fallen timbers plied the oceans with white sails of cloth billowing out above them.

The tradition of boarding would decide the fate of these two vessels for the last time.


	6. Every Last Inch

**Defiance**

* * *

_Author's Note_: Back again after a huge wait. Hopefully I've made it worth your while, short or not. I was doing NaNoWriMo.

* * *

**Chapter 5 Every Last Inch

* * *

**"Kelmar, Lionel, with me," barked Alanaldo, paw reaching to his hip. The otter was turning upon his heel, making for the lift doors. Kelmar was the first to draw his service gun, whipping the pistol in a circular motion about one finger. A set of lift doors opened with a low hiss, admitting the trio. Even as the portal was closing, Alanaldo could hear the sharp ping of a shipwide channel. 

"All hands, proceed to the nearest arming stations. Security teams, assemble at the the stern docking port on the starboard side and prepare to repel boarders."

* * *

The lift car plunged down the shaft at bone-crushing speeds, flattening its occupants to the walls. Then, with an equally jarring deceleration, the repulsors kicked in and slowed the car, opening both doors to a set of plain steel corridors. Kelmar, Lionel, and Alanaldo all had their guns drawn, heading down a side hallway. Within twenty seconds, they were joined by a squad of security officers, all armed not with pistols, but with lethal blasters and machine guns. 

They were nearing the docking port when they heard the loud hum of a cutting laser. The whine undulated, increasing in pitch for some seconds before it fell away. Alanaldo looked over at Kelmar for an explanation. The mechanic narrowed his eyes.

"Hull plating's still polarized," he said. "Their weapons can't cut through." Scarcely had he finished his sentence when a tremendous shudder raced through the ship, knocking many of them off their balance. There was a brief moment of near silence, then, an incredible roar filled the corridor as a weapon round slammed into the docking port, blasting it open and sending a fireball sweeping inwards. Containment fields snapped on, and before the encroaching vacuum could claim the security detail with its suction, their momentum was halted by the shimmering force.

Several seconds later, the black hole in the wall was blocked by the hard metal of the Elorian ship's hull. Alanaldo took a moment to look back at his men. Though some looked rattled, none were shying away from the battle ahead. He was glad for that.

The instant the Maya's docking port closed around the hull breach, the containment fields lowered. One of the security men input a command into a wall panel. From recessed positions in the deck plating, solid duraluminum partitions rose to half the height of the corridor, each with a single, rectangular viewpane. The same fur, a corpral, flashed an okay hand signal to another security detail which had just arrived on the other side when the first Elorians began to come through. Alanaldo dropped to one knee behind the nearest partition, half the width of the hallway, and leveled his pistol. He pulled the trigger, his gun kicking in his paw as it fired off a green laser burst. The shot clipped the shoulder of a well-armed tigress, and the boarder fell with a cry of pain. Shots began to pour in from the ruined airlock thick and fast. Most of the laser bolts were absorbed by the stout partitions and the walls, but every so often, a well-aimed plasma bolt or laser shot found its mark. Yet the battle was about even when a red-hued particle beam streaked in through the portal, whining loudly. After several seconds, the barrier the shot hit exploded into flame, instantly killing the three men huddled behind it. More particle beams were rushing in now, and Alanaldo signaled for an expedient retreat.

Revi's careful tracking of the security details was coming into play now- as the men slipped away to find a new location, the remaining shields were being lowered, leaving the Elorians out in the open and without cover. A dampening field rose at the second defense position. Lionel aimed his pistol, taking care to allow the barrel to protrude from the field, and fired. At the same time, a particle blast surged towards him. The laser bolt killed the firing soldier, and the beam dissipated upon contact with the field. With this new advantage, the Cornerians began to press the Elorians back.

At the docking port, however, a well-built wolf hefted a shoulder cannon and fired a plasma round which arced through a dampening field and struck the control panel. The partitions jammed in place and the field flickered, allowing a flurry of particle beams to blaze in through the gaps. The concentration of energy caused explosions of sparks to fountain from the walls, some detonating partitions and killing or severely wounding those behind them. As the Cornerians stepped away from their defenses to retrieve the wounded, they were shot down as well, though some were able to crawl back to shelter.

Alanaldo's service gun gave a sharp bark as it fired off another round, the silver-barreled weapon glinting fiercely in the green light that erupted from its muzzle. The unrelenting barrage of fire from both sides continued, and before much longer, the entire corridor was filled with fires, burning red from blown circuitry or ionized metals, or an intense shade of violet from plasma shot. At last, reinforcements from deep within the ship began to arrive, bearing larger gattling guns and plasma cannons. Ionized bursts of azure plasma arced from the gattling guns as larger projectiles flew from the maws of the cannons, only adding to the colorful, rainbow tapestry of lasers and plasma that were flying in the hall. Yet the Elorians began to rally once more, their own captain stepping up to fire his own weapon, rifle kicking slightly with each bolt of synthesized plasma.

Furs were falling like leaves when Alanaldo rolled out from behind the barrier, raising his weapon to make his shot. In the split second after he had fired, the wily Elorian sidestepped the burst and shot back. Alanaldo rolled sideways once more, coming up in a smooth motion to fire yet again.

Laser met plasma, causing both the explode in a dazzling burst of light and a dull roar as the plasma combusted. The blazing comet raced past Alanaldo to impact a partition behind him, where it blew up into a shower of burning material. The barrier had done its job for once.

Alanaldo scarcely noticed as a round struck him in the shoulder, burning through his uniform and scorching a raw, bloody hole in his skin. The captain staggered, firing a wild shot which arced away from the Elorian captain and struck the wall behind.

But before the rifle could come up to make the finishing shot, two other guns fired at once, lasers spiraling through the air to take the captain squarely in both eyes. Lionel and Kelmar raced out from behind their shelter to drag the unconscious Alanaldo to safety. The firing started up again almost immediately- yet without their captain, the demoralized crew was routed and driven back onto their ship.

The Verity was at that moment able to break away, and as containment fields snapped on, the titans ripped apart, sending damaged hull plating flying in every direction. Elorians were sucked out into the void, bodies tumbling, freezing, stilling as they suffocated, corpses solidifying within seconds and several exploding from the decompression.

A blaze of crimson fury rippled out from the port side of the Verity, a focal laser which tore through space and ate into the Maya's hull plating. Now almost completely devoid of power, the warbird came around, engines firing weakly as her guns opened up.

It was the last cry of defiance. At this final salvo, a wave of golden energy rolling through space, the engines of the Maya died, sputtering briefly before sizzling out. Within the ship itself, great thunks echoed through the corridors as the plasma injectors clanked shut, no more matter there to flow through the ship's veins.

Revi looked at the pitiful sight upon the viewscreen, and gave a shake of his head. He keyed in his commands, watching as with slow, majestic glory, a flight of plasma rounds streaked away from the small aft cannons. These tiny bolts of yellow, normally of no harm to anything at all, were the bringers of death to the battered relic before them.

With hungry jaws of searing heat, the plasma ate into the hull, exploding beneath the battle-worn plating, igniting plasma residue within dry conduits.

In its final moments, the ERS Maya, the last bastion of Elorian hopes for decades, burned as bright as a torch, pillars of fire streaking from breaches in the hull. Then there was an explosion, and the ship was gone.

The Verity was not there to see it. That ship had leapt to warp only seconds before, with its captain lying almost comatose in sickbay. It was bound home, now.

If they had men enough to make it, that was.


	7. Breaching the Border

**Defiance**

* * *

_Author's Note_: Of all my stories, Defiance has probably suffered the worst delays. Well, here's another update- the final one. 

Defiance was intended to be a short story to be written in a short time. It didn't meet the latter, but this tale is winding down now to its bitter conclusion. I thank everyone who reviewed up till here and to everyone for their patience. I was going to drive this on a little longer, but here's where it should end. It's not a fulfilling one, nor is it a happy one. But it's an ending to a story, and one that I believe is a true conclusion- what I wanted it to be, just shorter.

* * *

**Chapter 6 Breaching the Border

* * *

**The Verity shuddered and jerked, vibrations coursing through the ship's hull as it fought to ride the warp stream. The walls of the channel were pale, flickering. No longer did they hold the brilliant, shifting radiance of a clear and sunlit sea. Now, they reflected the bitter and harsh tones of a storm-tossed sea, darkened teal fading to navy blue, patches of near-black studding the stream walls here and there. 

Though the corridors were still well-lit with white light, the illumination panels mounted in the ceiling were flickering every so often, reminding every surviving crewman aboard that their ship was a damaged one. Computer terminals displayed various diagnostics in red and green lines of text, pinpointing the many and varied malfunctions now plaguing the ship.

* * *

Kelmar stood before the ship's plasma core, watching the behemoth structure pulsate with intermittent bursts of energy. The plasma core looked like a fat cylinder that had been squashed in one direction, forming oval faces, and laying sideways. It was crafted of highly-polished silver that reflected the lighting of main engineering in dazzling patterns. In the front, a center-mounted terminal controlled the plasma reactions inside, while on both sides, reinforced crystalline glass and force fields showed the swirling green and white of the plasma within. 

All along the core were regularly-placed trace lines which also reflected this glow, allowing engineers to visibly discern if part of the core was losing power. Normally, the plasmas core was an absolutely beautiful sight, alight with the colors of nature, yet showing the dazzling silver of civilization.

Now, however, sprays of sparks were shooting out from patches of darkened metal, and the plasma that eddied within the core now showed tints of blue, cooler plasma. The core was acting much the way a fur did when coughing, firing off random bursts of energy through the power conduits as it struggled to maintain reaction temperature.

The bewildering mass of gauges displayed on the central computer showed both falling and rising readings, all taken in by Kelmar at a glance. The core temperature was dropping as a whole, while specific portions, particularly those damaged by the concussive shock of the Elorian weapons, were cooling even more rapidly. Plasma pressure was falling as well, while the density was increasing towards the critical point. If the plasma became too dense, it would become too turgid to sustain more reactions.

The otter turned to another engineer. "Proton burst, through the main injectors. Fifteen seconds."

"Understood, sir!" barked the other, and he scurried off to another console. Keys were tapped, and main engineering shook as the plasma reacted, almost igniting the loose protons before absorbing the heat that the particles now carried. The core temperature rose briefly, then began to fall, again in graduated steps.

"Continue the bursts at one minute intervals," called Kelmar, even as his own paws flew across the keyboard before him, manipulating current flow inside to maximize thermal capacity. Not for a moment did his gaze tear away from the screen before him- losing the plasma core at warp meant almost certain death.

* * *

The bridge rocked and shuddered to another bump in the current, causing the lights to flicker briefly before the conduits re-aligned and the anomalies ceased. Alanaldo scowled at the viewpanes before him, watching the dim walls peel away and fade from sight. The navigational computer was having difficulty pinpointing Corneria, but it looked as if, at last, they were well on their way there. 

At their current speed, it would take two more days to reach their home planet- if the ship didn't come apart before then. With Revi and Lionel monitoring every facet of the ship with their eagle eyes, though, and Kelmar banging away down below, Alanaldo doubted that.

Of course, he mused, it wouldn't be a comfy ride. He was slammed back into his seat as another proton surge was released. And then he allowed himself the luxury of an oath.

* * *

Stars wheeled by in place of the rising and setting sun, with little change to mark the passing of night and day. Only the ship's chronometer confirmed that they were closing on their destination. 

All at once, alarms went off around the ship, stirring a brooding bridge crew back to life. Alanaldo looked towards Revi, whose paws brought up diagnostics at a furious pace, watching readings and meters all over the blue-tinted screen.

"We've passed through some kind of energy field. Looks like a detection grid."

"A detection grid?" exclaimed Alanaldo, shooting up from his chair and striding to the tactical terminal. "None should be-"

"Two ships approaching!" interrupted Revi. "Their hulls match Grallian alloy signatures! They're charging weapons!"

"How?" demanded Alanaldo, before slamming his paw onto the comm panel. "Kelmar, we're going to need all the power we can get, now!"

"Plasma core's redlining as is, captain!" came the reply, "But I'll give you what I've got!"

The Verity's engines blazed with ionic flame, becoming starbursts in the eyes of its pursuers. Within the ship's hull, the roar of the engines became a high-pitched, keening scream that threw crewmembers to the deck in agony. Main engineering resembled a fireworks display as overloading plasma and electrical conduits vented excess energy in explosive showers of sparks. The smell of smoke was thick in the air, an acrid scent rising from the overloading plasma core as it was forced to react hard plasma.

Despite all efforts, the plasma density continued to rise, drawing closer and closer, then far beyond the redline for plasmatic reactions. All over the ship, the lights dimmed and flickered. Computer consoles flashed on and off, while others crashed completely. The containment fields maintaining core integrity began to fail, setting off piercing alarms and adding to the din in engineering.

* * *

There was a sudden, massive explosion that drowned out every other sound and filled the entire ship with blinding white light. Captain Alanaldo was wrested from his seat and thrown asunder, slamming into the wall and sliding down with an unheard grimace of pain. 

Amazingly, when the sparks cleared, the ship was intact. The bridge was screeching to the shield failure alarm, even while the computer struggled to bring hull polarization online. From the cracked viewpane, the captain could see erratic waves of blue energy racing across the hull, conflicting with one another to depolarize the armor, even while another wave would undo the error.

"Damage report!" he gasped out, scrabbling with both paws before finding purchase in the wall and wrestling himself into a standing position. There was no answer from damage control- through his spinning vision, Alanaldo was able to discern Lionel's charred corpse, burnt almost black from the flames erupting from his station.

After a moment, the computer responded, voice distorted and crackling. "Shield failure on all sides. Main plasma core is offline. Warp drive is offline. Hull polarization disrupted. Structural integrity compromised. Weapons are functional at fifty percent efficiency. Auxiliary power to starboard hull has failed. Fission fusion cores are online."

"Fire suppression systems are online," came the same voice, some seconds later. Plumes of concentrated carbon dioxide came rushing from key points around the bridge, flooding the room with white vapor. The deck was no longer visible beneath the shifting clouds, but at least the fires stopped.

Alanaldo wrested the helm over, surging the ship around to face onto its attackers. Ahead, he could see the massive shapes of the Grallian ships, their coppery hulls standing in stark contrast to the shining jewel of Corneria behind them. The computer marked out defensive installations and multiple habitat rings, all bearing the same Grallian signature.

Not a single trace of Cornerian alloy could be found. His ship was the last, then. Revi had one paw clasped to his breast, the other resting against tactical, the station he had served so long at.

The sensor data scrolling over the viewpanes was being broadcast now to every screen aboard the vessel. Few were still alive to see it.

* * *

Kelmar and Gary were two of them. Gary watched in silence from his sickbay, the static-filled, blurring image on the screen filling his world, even as the hiss of decompression sounded around him.

* * *

Kelmar only bowed his head. All around him, the corpses of crewmen littered the ground, joining the rubble of his ship in the destruction that lay thick upon the ship. The dark plasma core in front of him showed a swirling blue, and the lights were those of orange emergency lamps as power faded away. 

Abruptly, the containment fields around the core collapsed, sending a wall of dry plasma into main engineering through the shattered panels. Great sprays of electricity ignited it, and Kelmar was incinerated in the resulting inferno, the remains of his body borne outwards upon a plume of violet flame before turning to dust.

* * *

"Warning- a plasmatic detonation has been detected in main engineering. Auxiliary power is offline." Alanaldo barely registered the voice, standing upon his wrecked and ruined bridge. A few seconds later came another alert. 

"Decompression of sickbay on deck five."

"Weapons are offline," said Revi, voice flat, wiping away an unwanted tear from his eye. "Their next volley will have us."

The captain gave no answer, save for the turn of the helm. The engines, coughing erratically and spewing smoke responded to the final command, thrusting the ship forwards towards the Grallian battleships before dying out completely.

The dead lance of steel hurtled onwards for a few moments. It was met by a single beam of red plasma, which diffused over the polarized hull plating for an instant, before it broke through. The ship glowed from within, crimson light flooding out stress fractures in the hull, before the Verity exploded outwards, hull scattering into darkness and bodies whirling out into space.

* * *

Many years later, a team of Grallian historians pieced together the sensor logs recorded that day. The destroyed ship matched the war records of the Cornerian Starfleet vessel, the CSS Verity. The ship was presumed lost one-hundred years ago, going missing only a year before Corneria's capitulation. 

The captain of the IGS Quicksilver, one of the two battleships that had destroyed the Verity that day, eventually published an article of his thoughts. The ship was an old one, he knew, but its final charge had left a lasting impact on him.

Now, so long after that crew was dead, so long after their home was taken, they were awarded their final tribute. Reconstructed Cornerian flags flew for one day as antimatter fireworks burst in the sky. Cornerians could remember the time when their home was their own- one last time.


End file.
